Mendlesohn, Farah, Ed. On Joanna Russ

Mendlesohn, Farah, ed. On Joanna Russ. Middletown: Wesleyan UP, 2009. 285 pp. Paper. ISBN 978-0-8195-6902-8. $29.95. Farah Mendlesohn's edited volume on the radical feminist sf author and academic Joanna Russ exemplifies the pleasures of a skillfully edited and fully conceptualized book. The sequencing of the sixteen essays allows the reader to follow a discernable trail of logic, with admirably smooth transitions, from first to last. Often, pieces that deal with the same work(s) by Russ are placed next to each other, and this allows for a satisfying overview of Russ's writings from multiple perspectives. The result is a broad and more complex understanding of Russ's art and politics than could be gained from any single critic using only one theoretical frame. This benefits the readers of Mendlesohn's volume by usefully highlighting how complex a writer Russ is and how her many interests and concerns manage to be so compactly and artfully crafted into her fiction. These essays go a long way toward illuminating her works and underscoring their continued relevance to academics and society in general.